← Independent Americans with Paul Rieckhoff
Independent Americans with Paul Rieckhoff
Markwayne Mullin in the Hotseat. Tulsi Gabbard Dances. Where is the Uranium?!?
00:37:42
Independent Americans host Paul Rieckhoff is back with an urgent, fast-moving solo episode breaking down Trump’s escalating war with Iran, the threat around unsecured Iranian uranium, and what rising force protection levels at U.S. bases like MacDill really mean for your family and community. He spotlights the human cost of conflict with a powerful poem by Lucas Jones, digs into growing dissent inside Trump world from voices like Joe Kent and Tulsi Gabbard, and explains why confirming Markwayne Mullin to lead ICE would fuel more lawlessness instead of the culture change America needs. Along the way, Paul connects it all to your daily life—from global instability to soft targets at home—and reminds you why staying informed, engaged, and vigilant matters now more than ever.
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Navy Seals, Delta, whoever. There are plans on his table to do it, including projections of casualties and overflow. And this is a space you definitely need to watch because it is in Trump's court now, how he decides and if he decides to tackle and secure Iran's uranium, then what happens to it? This is going to be very dynamic and it's another area especially where you need to ask hard questions, ask people in the press, ask your members of Congress. Where the fuck is the uranium. Welcome to Independent Americans. Welcome to episode 468. I am your host, Paul Rykoff and It is Wednesday, March 18th and I'm coming to you again from New York City, usa. And the weather is. Man, still damn cold. It's just cold. Winter is not going out without a fight and the times are coming in like a lion this March, but it is still in the 30s, only a high of like 38. So I'm going to try to bring you some light to warm up those cold times. And today's artist of the day, the day. The artist I share every day with my boys is Bon Iver. I had to make sure I said it right. It is Bon Iver. I googled the pronunciation because Bon Iver is good for gloomy times and reflective times. Of course they are the greats behind or he is a great behind skinny, love for Emma and blood bank, which is something we're going to need more of, unfortunately, as casualties continue to mount in the Middle East. But Justin Vernon is the guy behind Bony Bear. He's been a vocal critic of Donald Trump. He's been protesting his policies, immigration, and he wore a whistle on the red carpet to honor legal observers recently at the Grammys. He's been a righteous dude and he makes incredible music. And I hope it can help you through this wild and weird Wednesday. And I'm going to try to do the same. I'm going to bring you the five eyes. I bring you in every show. Independence, integrity, information, inspiration and impact. No guests today, just me because I got to fire through a lot of what's happening in a very, very crazy day. But I will have Miles Taylor in a special conversation coming up either later today or tomorrow. Just look out for that. We have a new announcement. We are hooking up with his group defiance.org to support our work. And I'm going to have a very important conversation with Miles Taylor, who you may remember worked in the Trump administration and became Anonymous. Anonymous wrote an op ed criticizing the administration and was one of the first to break ranks with the Trump administration, which is important because that same trend may be happening now. So look out for that. But in this one, it's just a quick fire solo episode with me to react and break down the latest on this wild and weird hump day. So let's stay vigilant Art America. The World Baseball Classic is over and it was a heartbreaker for the US we're going to have a lot of heartbreakers for the US this year, it feels like. And I'll have more on that coming up later in the show. And March Madness doesn't start until tomorrow. So we are back to the hornet's nest of Trump's latest war and all that it has unleashed. And that is most definitely our top topic. All right, folks, the war continues. Continues to overflow into our politics, into our economy, into the global order. And I want to share with you a poem by a guy I read a lot, the fantastic Lucas Jones. You don't follow him, especially on Instagram or TikTok. Please do. I think he's just an absolutely brilliant poet and he wrote a piece called the Enemy Wins. The enemy wins. Not when the last bomb falls, not when his flag is raised. The enemy wins. When the children die and us in anger and grief and rage, we dance and applaud when we have become him. That is when the enemy wins. And that's a good reminder, because right now, the enemy is winning most of all because Trump is making more of them more and more by the day. That's what his policies, his words, his minions are doing in the Middle east and around the world. As more and more people hate America, he's got another decision to make. Whether or not to retrieve Iran's nuclear fuel, whatever the risk. He's apparently contemplating a mission to seize or destroy Iran's nuclear material. It would be one of the riskiest operations in modern American history. Now, this is really, really important because I've said it many times before, going back to before the war, where the fuck is the uranium? If the reason we're going in is to take out Iran's nuke capabilities, which is one of the rationales they've had, it'd be a good idea to secure the uranium, but that uranium has not been secured. This could be an incredibly dangerous operations operation for our most elite units. Navy SEALs, Delta, whoever, there are plans on his table to do it, including projections of casualties and overflow. And this is a space you definitely need to watch because it is in Trump's court now, how he decides and if he decides to tackle and secure Iran's uranium, then what happens to it? This is going to be very dynamic and is another area, especially where you need to ask hard questions, ask people in the press, ask your members of Congress, where the fuck is the uranium? It's one area in particular. We need to stay vigilant. All right? We also need to understand that the overflow potential of what's happening is hitting American forces around the world. I am a veteran myself. I've got so many friends all across the military and veterans community who are under tremendous pressure, who are conducting operations. And I want to bring your attention to something that they are facing right now. MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Florida, houses CentCom, the headquarters central Command. They announced that its force protection level, or F or fpcon has been raised from Bravo to Charlie. They put out announcements. They actually put them on social media and they wrote that MacDill Air Force Base is now FCOM Charlie. This posture allows us to implement deliberate security measures proactively. All personnel should remain vigilant, follow directions security force and report any suspicious activity immediately. Be patient as we expect delays and heavier normal gate, heavier than normal gate traffic. We appreciate your cooperations. They post a phone number, they post an email. Now, the force protection con levels are important because that's In Tampa, Florida. We've talked in the past about threats to California. Threats are being waged and assessed all around bases all around the world. We've got American military personnel in over 100 countries and they all have different force protection levels. And our friend Happy Captain over on X laid out the force protection con levels that I think you need to know because you're going to hear these Alpha through Delta. Alpha applies to a non specific threat of a terrorist or terrorist attack, hostile act directed against DoD elements and personnel. What you should do is detect. Brava applies when an increased or more predictable threat of terrorism, attack or hostile act exists and is directed against DoD elements and personnel. The response is to delay force protection Con. Charlie applies when a terrorist or hostile incident occurs within the commander's area of interest or intelligence is received indicating a hostile act, some form of terrorist action or targeting of DoD elements, personnel or facilities. Deny is the response. And Delta applies when a terrorist attack or hostile attack has occurred or is anticipated against specific installations or or operating areas. Now, a reminder. This base in Tampa that houses CENTCOM is at Charlie, which means their responsibility is to deny any hostile incidents from occurring. But that is second only to the top, which is Delta. And I think those force protection levels are going to be something we're all much more familiar with in the days to come. Not just around military bases, but around sensitive sites, soft targets and even civilian targets around this country. And it's another area where I'm going to try to bring light to contrast the heat. You might not hear about this kind of stuff on other podcasts, definitely not on cable news, but I'm going to try to help you, your family and the people you care about. Stay vigilant, all right? Staying vigilant. Joe Kent's resignation has sent shockwaves across Trump world. He is the second in command in national security opera. So he answers to Tulsi Gabbard as Trump's war continues to divide MAGA world, Trump world. And now he's speaking out to another critic of the war in Iran, Tucker Carlson. He will apparently be recording an interview today with Tucker Carlson. I may have clips for that for you later in the week, but there's a scoop that John Hudson has over at the Washington Post that said Joe Kent and Tulsi Gabbard met with Vice President J.D. vance at the White House on Monday. During the meeting, Kent presented his resignation to the Vice President. Kent, the Vice President, encouraged him to speak to White House Chief of Staff and POTUS before making any final decisions. The VP encouraged him to be respectful to potus. He went on to post his piece and now he's speaking out to Tucker Carlson and he is criticizing the war in Iran and maybe a dam of support for Trump is breaking. We're going to watch this space in you should too. Which of course forces our eye over to asking, where is Tulsi Gabbard? Where is Tulsi? Well, she's testifying today before Congress. More on that in a second. But she posted a pretty interesting non statement yesterday on X about 3 o' clock in the afternoon after Joe Kent, because everybody was looking to see what she was going to say and she basically said nothing. She said Donald Trump was overwhelmingly elected by the president, by the people, to be our president and commander in Chief. As our commander in chief, he is responsible for determining what is a threat and what is not an imminent threat, or whether or not to take action he deems necessary to protect the safety and security of our troops, the American people and our country. The Office of the Director of National Intelligence is responsible for helping coordinate and integrate all intelligence to provide the President and Commander in Chief with the best information available to inform his decisions. After carefully reviewing all the information before him, President Trump concluded that the terrorist Islamic regime in Iran posed an imminent threat and he took action based on that conclusion. Not a lot of details there and definitely not like an enthusiastic, full supported endorsement of Trump. And it seems kind of like a cover your ass type statement, but it's a word salad of nothing, which is what she would have been better off posting than that. But we're going to dig more into Tulsi Gabbard and her testimony in just a second. But let's talk about the other fireworks today. I'm watching this stuff, maybe so you don't have to, but today was also the Senate confirmation and House confirmation hearings of Senator Mark Wayne Mullen, who is testifying before Congress to replace Kristi Noem. This is definitely fireworks. And I don't know what's the opposite of fireworks, like low works. He is, as I've said before, I think the dumbest member of the Senate, maybe second to Kennedy and Tuberville, but he's down there way lower in terms of wattage. Right. And there was a pretty good demonstration of that today in an exchange he had with Senator Peters. Check this out. Volunteer or otherwise involved with the Department of Defense, State department or other U.S. agency or contractor for any of those departments. No. And Senator, I think there's a misunderstanding here that I could clear up if you want me to clear up for you, please. Okay, so which. This is a. It's. This is official trip and it is classified, but in 2015, I was asked to train with a very small contingency and go to a certain area which was scheduled for 2016. During that time, I was asked to go through, had to meet certain training qualifications, certain qualifications, had to go through tier training. The training and stuff was kind of fun. The sear training. Now what the hell is that mess? It's another word salad. And it's just. It's just so shady. All of it and all of him. This stuff around, whether or not he smelled war and trying to act kind of like he's a veteran, but everybody knows he's not. But it's shady and they're all shady. I mean, he's not a person of integrity that the American people can trust. It's like hearing Tulsi Gabbard years ago and often including on this show, try to explain her shady meeting with then Syrian president and war criminal Bashar Assad. I'm going to play the clip here, if we can.
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These regime change wars, wars or efforts to topple dictators in other countries have often been waged, most often waged actually, in the guise of humanitarianism, when in fact those actions have made the lives worse off for the people in those countries.
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But Tulsi Gabbard was among the first 30 guests we ever had on my show. And I asked her, I asked her, like many people did, what the fuck is up with your relationship with Assad? It was something that concerned everyone. And she met with Assad. We never could get the full truth around what happened in that meeting. And it reminded me of this answer today from Mark Wayne Mullen, who acts like he was James Bond on some secret mission. But what's with these people and their weird secret spy shady meetings? Oh, and on Mullen, I got to share this with you. He also apparently thinks dueling is still legal. Yeah, dueling, you know, when two people go and try to shoot each other in a field? Yes, he thinks that dueling is still legal. Check this out. In the days after the fight, you did many interviews in which you justified the violence as historically justified by precedents
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such as caning and dueling.
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Is it today your opinion that the caning of Charles Sumner was not only
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justified, but argues that still for resolving
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our political differences with violence. What I was simply pointing out is some of the rules that still apply to this body. For instance, dueling with two consenting adults is still there. I was Pointing out what is still legal for 170 years. There's no precedent for legal dueling. Even then, they fled the country. Do you realize that? The man that beat Charles Sumner with a cane, he beat him till he was unconscious.
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You know why no senators intervened?
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Because his friend held a gun on the other senators. And he kept beating him and beating him until he crushed his skull.
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That's what you're insinuating is the President of the Senate. And that's what you live by.
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That is a very, very dangerous sentiment. So Rand Paul reminding him that dueling has been illegal for 170 years. Mullen is, in my view, so dumb and just so bad. He thinks dueling is still legal. And clearly he thinks it should be. Yet another reason he should be disqualified from the job of running an agency that is already out of control, undisciplined, violent and unlawful. I said this many times. I will repeat it. ICE needs a total and complete dismantling. And most of all, it needs a culture change. Mullen would not be a culture change. He'd be the opposite. He'd be doubling down on all the things that are already wrong with it. He's like a roided out version of what Kirsty Noem used to say. Leadership climate and culture is so key, especially around these agencies. And he'd know that if he'd served in the military. But he hasn't. And confirming Mullen would be a green light, in my view, for more lawlessness, more abuse, more violence, and more death. And every senator should vote no. And you should tell them to vote no. Call them today. Call them now and tell them to vote no on Mullen. The people of ICE deserve better. The American people deserve better. You deserve better. We all deserve better. Stay vigilant.
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I like things my way, My coffee, my schedule and my treatment. So I talked to my doctor about self injecting with the Vivgard Hytrulo pre filled syringe which contains fgar, Tigamide Alpha and Hyaluronidase qvfc. It's injected under your skin subcutaneously. It means I can inject in my space on my time. It's my treatment, my way. Visit vivgardmyway.com that's V Y V G-A-R-T myway.com and talk to your doctor about Vivgard Hyrulo. Brought to you by Argenics.
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My name is Mackenzie and I started a GoFundMe for the adoptive mother of a nonverbal autistic child. The mother had lost her job because she wasn't able to find adequate care for this autistic child. So she really needed some help with living expenses, paying some back bills. So I launched a GoFundMe to help support them during this crisis. And we raised about $10,000 within just a couple of months. I think that the surprising thing was by telling a clear story and just like really being very clear about what we needed, we had some really generous donations from people who were really moved by the situation that this family was struggling with. GoFundMe is the world's number one fundraising platform, trusted by over 200 million people. Start your GoFundMe today at gofundme.com that's gofundme.com gofundme.com this podcast is supported by GoFundMe. Has the news been getting you down? I'm Megan McCardell and I'm here to help. I'm the host of a new show from Washington Post Opinion called Reasonably Optimistic. And it's an antidote to the pessimism that's riddling America right now. Every Wednesday, I'm gonna talk to people who see a path forward.
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It does seem to me that there is some awakening of a desire to act together to solve problems where they are.
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You know, I am a believer in America and that's worth fighting for.
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Join me Wednesdays on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.
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All right, now let's go back to Tulsi Gabbard, who has been testifying today. And it has been painful to watch. It's like watching somebody dance in a crossfire or dance in a hailstorm. I mean, it is. It is a political dance that she's generally quite good at, but this is not a good showing for her and for the administration and the whole world can see it. Check this out.
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Was it the assessment of the intelligence community that there was a, quote, imminent nuclear threat posed by the Iranian regime?
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Yes or no, Senator? The only person who can determine what is and is not an imminent threat is the President.
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False.
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This is the worldwide.
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This is the worldwide threat hearing where you present to Congress national intelligence, timely, objective, and independent of political considerations. You've stated today that the intelligence community's assessment is that Iran's nuclear enrichment program was obliterated and that, quote, there had been no efforts since then to try to rebuild their enrichment capabilities. Responsibility. Was it the intelligence community's assessment that nevertheless, despite this obliteration, there was a, quote, imminent nuclear threat posed by the Iranian regime? Yes or no?
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It is not the intelligence community's responsibility to determine what is and is not an imminent threat.
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Okay, that is up to. Here's the problem based on a volume.
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No, it is. It is precisely that he received. It is precisely your responsibility now.
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Ossoff. Senator Ossoff from Georgia, I think, is rising to this moment. He could be now a presidential nominee considered from the Democrats. I think his name is going to circulate more and more. He's young, he's dynamic, he's a good communicator. So watch that space. He's never been on this show before, but I would welcome him to do that. But let's talk about Gabber. I don't think she survives this. She's already not trusted in Trump world because she's a former Democrat and she's not trusted by most people, period. But sooner or later, Trump is going to dump her and blame her. Like Noam and probably Hegseth at some point and so many others, he's probably going to dump her. But like Noam and Hegseth and so many others, she never should have been confirmed in the first place. Anyone who voted for her is responsible for this mess now. Anyone who voted for any of these people is responsible for this mess now. And I'm going to post roll calls so you can go back and see the people who said, oh, we had no idea Kristi Noem was going to be so crazy. We had no idea Doug Collins was going to be so radical. We had no idea that Pete Hegseth was gonna be a culture warrior. But they are responsible for this mess. Democrats and Republicans, mostly Republicans, but some Democrats too. And it's all coming to the fore now because all these leaders, these terrible, incompetent, disqualified leaders are being revealed because that's what war does. Especially a forever war that's overflowing beyond US Control. But don't celebrate it. As I said yesterday, around Hegseth's problems and his waffling and his flailing, don't celebrate it because this is bad for America. It's bad for our national security. It's bad for our military, it's bad for our intelligence community. And our enemies are celebrating. They're definitely celebrating yet again. And we are all less safe more and more by the minute. Our enemies are celebrating. Our enemies are celebrating. All right. I hope you dig the new song that Chris, our friend Chris Rosenthal, the brilliant producer and creative director behind the show, has created that helps us understand that our enemies are indeed celebrating. All the music in this show Chris puts together, and it's fantastic. If you're a Patreon member, you got Our Independence is an Attitude song yesterday. We're gonna try to post more of those on our YouTube page and other places. So look for that. But look for other things also that are below the radar. Now, in addition to the violence happening overseas, there's violence happening here in America that maybe has become so commonplace that people even pay attention. But yesterday, a person was shot at the VA clinic in Jasper, Georgia, and the suspected shooter has been killed by law enforcement. They airlifted a person out of the VA clinic. The suspected shooter is dead. Not a lot of details around that, but I hope to hear a non political, non extreme statement from the VA secretary, Doug Collins, about what the hell happened there. There have been a number of suicides on VA facilities. The threat of violence there is real, not just from veterans but but from terrorists, people who want to hurt veterans, people who want to hurt the people who serve veterans. So every VA facility is now a target for Iranian proxies and anyone who's sympathetic to Iran as well. And it's an area where we should definitely watch this space. Do not let it fall below the radar. When it comes to veterans. I'm going to remind you that 17 veterans a day are lost to suicide every day, every single day, and increasingly among men and women. Every day we're losing more. In recent years, the numbers have gotten worse and we have to help save our buddies. I always have resources linked in the show notes, but I will remind you that as we spend a billion dollars a day in Iran, imagine how far a billion dollars a day would go toward battling the suicide epidemic. It would be great if Hegseth and Trump could focus on battling suicide and battling homelessness and battling school shootings as much as they're battling Harvard and they're battling woke and maybe take a little bit of energy and battle Putin as well. But they're focused on the wrong things and they're leaving us especially vulnerable here at home. And it's another reason why we need to stay vigilant, because there was another one. You probably didn't even see this. But News Nation that I'm on on Wednesdays was one of the first to report that one person is dead, another is hurt after a shooting at Holman Air Force Base. Holloman Air Force Base had a shooting on a military base. We're continuing to find that information, but this is below the radar. I don't think. We had a statement from the president on that. I don't know if Hegseth has addressed it today, but if not, he should. And it's a reminder that in the homeland, our military facilities, our VA Facilities, our stadiums, as March Madness comes around, are all potential targets. And we all need to stay vigilant. All right, Because Trump is all gas, no brakes. Nothing is slowing him down. Nothing is even a speed bump. In other parts of the world, people are continuing to keep up the fight, even if Trump doesn't support them. That, of course, includes our friends in Ukraine. It is day 1484 of Russia's full scale invasion of Ukraine. Now I'm going to continue to focus on Ukraine always. You can check out our work at American Veterans for Ukraine at americanveteransforucraine.org check out a number of our episodes where we've talked to people in and around Ukraine, including Nolan Peterson recently, about drones, Tim Mack and others. But I will continue to try to keep a focus and support for Ukraine even and especially when our president does not. All right, let's move over to politics. There's still politics happening, you know, electoral politics. Yesterday was a primary day when millions of independents were blocked out of the primary system. As a reminder, if you're new here, primaries are publicly funded. They use public tax dollars, they use public schools, they use public poll workers. But they're private. In many states, like Illinois and others, you can't participate unless you join their private club, which I think is un American. Chuck Todd and I have questioned whether or not it's unlawful and it's definitely unacceptable. We're fighting to change that. It's why we have to support open primaries where everybody, where all independents, especially 45% of us, have a vote. That matters because we're not just moving the needle, we are the needle. But there were some results that came out of Illinois, including Juliana Stratton, won the Illinois Democratic Senate primary. Lt. Governor Julian Stratton will likely succeed Senator Richard Durbin. She beat two other House members and it puts her on a path to be the sixth black woman to serve in the Senate in history, which is crazy. There's only been six black women in the Senate in history. But that is likely to be the case, which is a good thing for history, but a bad thing for democracy. I mean, the primary is now happening in March and it's basically over. So I will encourage, as I have before, if any independent candidates, independent veterans, want to jump into that race to try to challenge her, to try to challenge the status quo, to try to force a real conversation, which the voters deserve. We're recruiting. Go to independentvetersamerica.org if you want to run for Senate in Illinois or down in South Carolina against Lindsey Graham if I can't get Stephen Colbert to do it, or, or against Pennsylvania against failed Fetterman or in any other places. We've got over half a dozen that are running now in Idaho like, like Todd Achilles, Seth Bodnar now in Montana, who will join me in a couple of weeks. Ty Pinkins, Brian Bangs and others. And lots of other folks down ticket running for mayors and even running for school board. Especially in a moment like this, if you're frustrated, we need you. Especially if you're an independent, step up and run. Leave the herds and join the pack. All right, speaking of politics in nyc here in New York, I want to bring your focus to something. Yesterday, newly elected Mayor Zorhan Marmdani marched in the St Patrick's Day parade, which is standard and that is great. The mayor always marches in the St. Patrick's Day parade. But I'll remind you, it's still terrible that he didn't march in the Veterans Day parade. This got a lot of friction from veterans here in New York City and not a lot of attention nationally. But. But unlike most recent elected mayors, he skipped the Veterans Day parade and instead, in a hasty kind of last minute event, he went to a homeless facility in the Bronx and served homeless veterans. Now imagine if he skipped the parade yesterday and instead met some homeless Irish American people instead of being at the parade. Or imagine if he did that at the Pride parade in June. He said, I'm not gonna go to the parade. I'm not gonna march in public in front of all the cameras and stand with the LGBTQ community or the Irish American community. I'm just going to do a little thing out of the, out of the spotlight. It was unacceptable that he didn't stand with veterans because symbolism matters. And he had a chance to meet with veterans in November and he skipped it. So I will remind him of that and I will remind you of that and give it a big thumbs down until Memorial Day is coming up. We'll see what he does there. And Veterans Day again next year. We need the mayor and we need all political leaders. No matter what your policies, no matter what your opinions of this war, you must still stand with veterans now and always. We're watching, we're voting, and we will hold you accountable. We will ask you all to stay vigilant. All right, let's talk about culture real quick. There's something I want to talk about. Banksy has been exposed again, sort of. There's a new really long, like 8,000 word investigation by Reuters that claims it has discovered the amazing street artist's true identity. It backs up claims that were made by the Mail in Britain on Sunday, the British tabloid, and decades ago that he is a 15 year old man whose name I'm not going to mention. But there is more news again that maybe someone has outed Banksy now after all these years, maybe it's happened. But I'm not going to tell you his name because he doesn't want, you know, his name, and he wants us to know his work, which I think is incredible and important and brave and courageous and impactful and popular enough that some people might want to hurt him. He's been to places like Ukraine. He's spoken out against people like Putin. He has been very, very brave and very, very uniquely effective in capturing pop culture and especially young people around issues of war and conflict and politics. Now, of course, I would welcome Banksy on this show anytime. We will hide your identity, change your voice, whatever we need to do. But I'm not going to help the people who want to out him or want to hurt him. I'm going to honor the wishes of who I think is one of the greatest and most important artists of the modern time. I'm not going to tell you who he is, but I am going to tell you he's amazing. And you should watch him because he's fighting back against all the bad guys around the world. He's standing for freedom and he's always helping us all stay vigilant. All right, sports. Let's talk about sports for a second. The intersection of sports and politics is kind of mind blowing. And last night was, of course, the spectacular conclusion of the World Baseball Classic. If you didn't see it, it was an incredible game capping off an incredible series. The US was down two nothing until the 8th. Bobby Witt got a walk on four pitches and then Bryce Harper crushed one. I mean an amazing two run homer. Then top of the 9th, Venezuela took the lead off a fantastic Suarez double and that was it. The Venezuelans beat the US 3 to 2 and it was a heartbreaking loss for the US and a spectacular, historic win for the people of Venezuela. One sidebar thing an interesting point that in the eighth inning Griffin Jacks came in to pitch for Team usa, who a lot of folks don't know this, is also currently a captain of in the Air Force Reserve. He went to the Air Force Academy and continues to serve. It's a great story and he's an important leader and he pitched a fantastic inning. But the US Loss and I want to shout out Bryce Harper, who not only hit a spectacular home run, but after the game he went over and congratulated Team Venezuela and showed that he's a true class act. This is important because not everybody on the US Team did that during this tournament. Cal Raleigh, the catcher for Seattle, refused to shake his teammate's hand from Mexico, which I thought was terrible. But as a reminder, our kids are watching. They're watching our president, they're watching Mark Wayne Mullen and Tulsi Gabbard. But of course they're watching our baseball players. And especially in times of war and in conflict, we need them to be leaders that our kids can look up to. But the loss was stunning but not surprising. The US has been kind of off the whole tournament and they never had any chemistry. They just never really clicked into their potential. We had better players, but they had a better team and so much heart. So much heart. So respect and hats off to Venezuela. What a team. What a run. They wanted it so bad and they deserved it, especially after all their country's been through in these last few months and years, including the whole Maduro extraction war thing initiated by Trump. Now there's so much we could read into this about recent events and the state of the world, but most of all, the entire tournament was just really great and extremely fun baseball. It showcased why we love this game so much all around the world. Now, hopefully Trump was asleep and missed it entirely and will have absolutely nothing to say about it today. We can all dream, right? But at least Keshe Patel was nowhere to be seen and didn't go near it and chug beers in the dugout with Aaron judge. But look, our country and the world are pretty screwed up right now. But for what it's worth, baseball has never been better. And opening day is only nine days away. A day of hope for every fan in America and around the world. And hope that hope you feel on opening day, Hope is the oxygen of democracy. We're going to need it more this year than ever before. And before we get to that, March Madness begins tomorrow. It's exciting. Fill out your brackets. Game start at midday on Thursday. It's going to be another source of hope, another source of unity in these difficult times and another time for us all to stay vigilant. All right, finally, let's talk about something good. Something good. I'm always going to bring you something good every day I can. And there's something good that's a good reminder, especially now. The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier is going to hit 100 years of having a military guard. The Stars and Stripes, which is under attack by Hegseth. By the way, I had a great piece about this. The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia will celebrate a milestone of being continuously guarded by Service members for 100 years on March 25 next week. If you don't know, the tomb was established in the wake of World War I, when an unknown Soldier died in the war and was interned on November 11, 1921, Armistice Day and also Veterans Day. It did not have an assigned military guard until March 25, 1926, after the Army's deputy chief of staff offered such a presence over concerns the monument was not being properly respected. It had a daytime guard until July 1, 1937, when it became guarded 24 hours a day, seven days a week in all weather conditions. If you've never been to Arlington to see the guards at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, I highly recommend it. You can also see video of them online. See when it's raining, when it's snowing, when it's lonely. They are out there defending that tomb, standing guard around that tomb and standing guard around our values. No matter how bad it gets for a hundred years they've been there. We're going to need them now as a symbol, especially now, to defend what is all and good in this country. And look to them for inspiration because after 100 years especially, they are definitely something good and a reason to follow their lead in staying vigilant. Stay vigilant. All right. A couple of endnotes here that I got to bring to you today. I'm going to have some TV coming up, News Nation with Connell McShane at three o'. Clock. I got to run up there right now. Ms. Now at five with Miles Taylor and Nicole Wallace and the crew. Miles Taylor, if you don't know, he's an ex national security official, bestselling author. He was anonymous and now he is the founder of defiance.org he was in the administration of Bush and Trump and he worked in dhs. So he's got a lot to say about what's going on. But he's been a brave voice challenging Trump, challenging authoritarianism. I think Trump's threatened to put him in jail about every other day. But he is going to be joining me on Deadline with Nicole Wallace to announce a new partnership we're doing and then he will join me on the show. We'll either post it later today or maybe early tomorrow. So look out for that and especially find us on YouTube where we are blowing up. I think we're up like a thousand percent in the last month, which is huge. A lot more folks are seeing our clips and hearing our message, especially after my appearance on Colbert a week and a half ago. Again, welcome to everybody who's new there and to those of you who saw me yesterday on Midas with Ken Harbaugh. I was on Al Franken's show Left, Right, Center. I'm talking to anybody who wants to hear our message and have a good conversation. We are daily and you can follow us on all social media platforms. Subscribe and get our merch. Go to our patreon community at IndependentAmericans US and be sure to subscribe on all platforms. Do us a solid. You're not paying for this content, so just hit a subscribe and it'll help us keep bringing independent voices to the masses and bringing light to contrast the heat. America is divided, but here at Independent Americans, we are working to change that, adding light to contrast the heat of all the other political shows. And my new campaign, our new campaign with the folks@diance.org will bring more people together in this moment where we can all unite. So if you're among the now 45% of Americans who are independent, especially this is your show. Democrats, Republicans, libertarians, Communists, if you're all independent, curious, you're welcome because our independent movement is how it started in this country with George Washington and how we need to get back to now to go forward to the future country of our party, people, of our politics. Light over heat, disrupting the status quo and fueling a new movement that is growing, especially in opposition to the Iran war and The Forever wars, which are at nine countries and counting. Hope that hope you feel around March Madness and opening day. And as spring comes, that's the oxygen of democracy. We gotta keep spreading it. So if you enjoyed this episode, share it far and wide. Invite others to declare their independence and stay vigilant, my friends, because eternal vigilance is the price of freedom. You know, you're not alone in that. Vigilant. Every day there are more of us. We're all vigilant and we're all in this together. I'm your host, Paul Rykoff. Thank you for tuning into Independent Americans. I will see you on TV later today. I will see you or hear you will hear me. Tomorrow you can listen to us on Apple podcasts and especially on YouTube and all other platforms. We will keep bringing it in the face of all of this March Madness. Happy Hump day. Enjoy the madness. The good part of the madness. You can leave some of the other stuff out and stay vigilant. America. Stay Vigilant tells me the left and
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right are dreams for those without a
- [41:13]
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It does seem to me that there is some awakening of a desire to act together to solve problems where they are.
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You know, I am a believer in America and it's worth fighting for.
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It really does help the show to grow.
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Thank you for listening.